"The most powerful time to communicate is when concern and emotions are running at their peak," said the 80-page document titled "Preventing Gun Violence Through Effective Messaging," and produced by three Democratic firms led by the polling and research outfit Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research. . . .

It is chilling how they want to use tragedies when the emotions are most raw to push their gun control program.

"The debate over gun violence in America is periodically punctuated by high-profile gun violence incidents including Columbine, Virginia Tech, Tucson, the Trayvon Martin killing, Aurora, and Oak Creek. When an incident such as these attracts sustained media attention, it creates a unique climate for our communications efforts," said the guide.

"A high-profile gun violence incident temporarily draws more people into the conversation about gun violence," added the talking points. "We should rely on emotionally powerful language, feelings and images to bring home the terrible impact of gun violence," said the guide, which also urged advocates use images of scary looking guns and shooting scenes to make their point. . . .

3 Comments:

It was pretty apparent by March that federal action was just air cover for the legislative action in state houses like Maryland and NY, where gun rights got creamed. Gun rights activists were completely caught by surprise. The word from the Maryland state house is that of all the calls, emails, and testimony, a significant fraction were not even registered to vote. How embarrassing. Don't show up to complain about your right being taken away if you are not even registered to vote.